Annixter looked once at the pair, then shouted with laughter.
"'Poultry'-- 'a chicken or two'-- 'fancy breed'-- ho! yes, I should think so.

Game cocks! Fighting cocks! Oh, you old rat! You'll be a dry nurse to a burro, and keep a hospital for infirm puppies, but you will fight game cocks.

Oh, Lord! Why, Sarria, this is as good a grind as I ever heard.

There's the Spanish cropping out, after all." Speechless with chagrin, the priest bundled the cocks into the basket and catching up the valise, took himself abruptly away, almost running till he had put himself out of hearing of Annixter's raillery.

And even ten minutes later, when Annixter, still chuckling, stood upon the porch steps, he saw the priest, far in the distance, climbing the slope of the high ground, in the direction of the Mission, still hurrying on at a great pace, his cassock flapping behind him, his head bent; to Annixter's notion the very picture of discomfiture and confusion.
As Annixter turned about to reenter the house, he found himself almost face to face with Hilma Tree.